Fringe Starts New Sci-Fi Season in a Funk

Primetime’s smartest sci-fi series — Fringe — returns for its fourth season Friday in a bit of a funk.

(Spoiler alert: Minor plot points follow.)

But it’s no wonder: Clever rogue Peter Bishop (Joshua Jackson), son of mad scientist Walter Bishop (John Noble) and almost-boyfriend of FBI paranormal investigator Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) has vanished in a blaze of electromagnetic anguish in an effort to make peace between rival parallel universes. He’s as good as dead, at least for now.

In the season premiere “Neither Here Nor There,” Walter manages to get off a couple of characteristically zany quips (“I’m growing an ear,” he says off-handedly to visitors) but Dr. Bishop is so depressed that he’s moved his bed into the Boston-based laboratory. And while Olivia dutifully tracks down translucent shape-shifters from another dimension, the case lacks pizzazz without the ever-resourceful Peter on hand.

Returning heroes Olivia, Walter, Astrid (Jasika Nicole) and Agent Broyles (Lance Reddick) fail to generate the kind of “Holy crap!” chills that mark most Fringe shows, but this season premiere serves mainly to introduce new character Lincoln Lee (Seth Gabel). The tightly-wound Connecticut detective, motivated by the gruesome killing of his best friend, demands answers, proves his worth to Olivia, and gains security clearance that points toward regular employment in the FBI’s Fringe Division.

Fringe will doubtless gain steam as the season proceeds. This is the same show, after all, that last season surprised viewers with an entirely animated episode and required Torv to mimic Leonard Nimoy’s voice for several shows after his character took possession of her body.

So what happened to Peter and when will he return to action? Showrunners Bryan Burk, J.H. Wyman, and Jeff Pinkner won’t spill the particulars but in a “letter” provided by Fox, fictitious “Peter Bishop” writes “Where I am exactly, I can’t precisely say. . . I can’t seem to see or hear anything. However, the writers and producers swear to me that I will be making my way back to Boston soon enough.”